Entertainment

Can the IITW Be a Web Workers' Union?

One of the most talked about (and at the same time most boring) topics this election cycle has been the topic of health insurance. Granted, it's one of the most important subjects to keep abreast of as an adult. In our world, the world of startups and entrepreneurism, getting company health coverage for yourself, much less your family, is almost impossible.

Historically, the response of workers that find themselves in the position that American IT and web workers do is to unionize and demand better wages and benefits from their employers, but those of us in tech have always tended towards the attitude of self-direction, which doesn't lend itself very well towards what unions have typically stood for.

A good friend of mine for almost a decade and a half is working to bridge the gap for technology workers. James Smith and his current business partner Jack Edwards were interviewed on InfoWorld about an organization they're putting together called the International IT Worker's Group. The idea of the organization is to provide some of the benefits of a union without sacrificing the needs and desires of the individual to the greater collective of a union.

Disclosure: James and I Go Way Back

That also means, though, that I'm pretty well equipped to understand his idea here and the inspirations behind it since through the years we've shared so much professional history. I'm not involved in this venture of his, so the only self-serving thing I have to gain from his success is that he'd have a nicer couch for me to surf next time I visit.

Disclaimers aside, though, as someone who's worked through a similar history of small startups and large corporations as James and Jack (often side by side with them), I understand the motivating factors that helped shape the direction that they've decided to apply the IITW towards. Portable health care services is one very important part, but also integral to the organization's purpose is educational services, legal services and assistance with job placement.

A lot of that sounds similar to the traditional union structure, but the difference here is that IITW doesn't aim to be a collective agent for leveraging employee solidarity against the technology employers of the world. Aside from the fact that tech workers are typically against the idea of unions to begin with, the industry is situated in such a way that there is no social repercussions for hiring outside a union, nor is it particularly difficult to do so.

Additionally, Edwards' years as a member of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) helped him decide how he didn't want the IITW to operate. He remembers one particular day when he was managing a crew that was performing a time-sensitive electrical job. The project was quite complicated, and his crew fell behind.

"I have never been one to sit back and watch other people work, so I jumped in and helped complete the job," Jack Edwards said. "An IBEW union rep told me that it was against the bylaws for me to be doing the work, so I quit the union."

This is a sentiment that rings true especially for us in the startup world. The last thing we'd need in our culture is a unionized mentality, preventing coders from plugging in a network cable or keeping the coworking space's network dude from tapping out a script to automate the backup, or some equally plausible yet still ridiculous scenario.

It's something that James and I chatted about yesterday after the Infoworld write-up came out, and he mentioned another reason as to why they want to stay away from the traditional union role.

"We've been on both sides of the fence, and you know as well as I do our business is filled with startups from their mom's garages, there's no way that model could thrive while tangling with unions," said James. "On the other hand, the same kids that may be working nights in that garage on a startup are spending their days as a contractor coding for Nokia or managing servers for The Planet, and need the benefits a union-like organization can provide."

This idea should go on the recession proof list...

Assuming the IITW gains the traction it needs to be sustainable, this is one of those ideas that might be timed just perfectly. The recent election combined with the economic downturn has finances on the minds of most of us, and anything that can help us keep our jobs (or at least find new ones more easily) will add to a sense of much needed peace of mind.

To that end, the educational services aspect is what sounds most interesting and ambitious to me. Certainly, selling portable health care on a mass scale is important stuff, but the plans for standardized educational and certification programs are what really have interested me the most when he's talked to me about it.

For the last several years as I've become more and more entrenched with this whole New Media 'fad', I've been evangelizing the virtues of the various formats that term encompasses. It seems he's been taking that to heart, and has put together detailed plans to create distance learning programs that utilize online streaming and video podcasting technologies to better facilitate the certification process.

He hasn't made it clear at what stage they plan on deploying that part of the IITW program, but it could be as soon as the first quarter of the new year, which is when the health insurance program is slated to come online.

Up until that point, they offer free membership and access to the groups internal social network. It's definitely worth checking out, and a resource to keep an eye on to see how it develops. If it gains momentum, it could be invaluable.

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